Comedy Review: Vittorio Angelone's 'You Can't Say Nothing Any More' at the Nottingham Arts Theatre

A wonderfully refreshing and sprite, fiddle and accordion duo from the five-piece band Cúig, perform Irish traditional music as the audience filled the auditorium, setting the tone and agenda for the evening. But this sold-out theatre is here for the comedian with an Italian name and a Belfast accent, whose meteoric rise has seen him supporting some of the bigger names on the comedy circuit; evidencing his talent is matched by a good an agent and his online content promotor.

Explaining he could only afford forty percent of Cúig, which means five in Irish, he initiates a can amnesty, encouraging the audience to all open their cans at the same time, eliciting a collective metal on metal ‘psst’ as gaggle of beer cans are opened. One member of the audience has the audacity to make this noise with his mouth, results in him spending the next twenty minutes having his and his partners love life scrutinised, about how they came to be together, extracting much merriment. All whilst mining the comedy in the simultaneous nude life drawing class upstairs in the theatre, the perils of a polyamorous relationships and GP Receptionists.

The second half sees him suited and booted like a history teacher, which is detracted by his mullet and moustache. He takes us on a roller coaster ride through his experiences of personal trainers, his poor mental health and how he is routinely asked every six months to present a TV documentary on The Troubles. Born two years before the Good Friday Agreement, he is the generation who grew up in the relative peace that it ushered.  He enlightens as to how his parents' generation's trauma, results in their inability to talk about it, how his grandparents Ice Cream Café was bombed in 1975 by the UVF. He ties it all together, summarising how when he moved to London, he found that the response him saying he was from Belfast was ‘Are you OK?’

Essentially, Vittorio continues the tradition of intelligent Irish comedians holding a mirror up to the English, showing them for what they are, encouraging them to laugh at themselves, whilst enlightening them as to their real history. He has the ability to make deeply provocative subjects hilarious. He presents the question should comedians use their platforms to highlight seriously significant issues ranging from how we accept the low paid Deliveroo culture as long as we get a hot takeaway, through to the genocide in Palestine. He celebrates the new wave of Irish creatives in music, literature, film and poetry, while asserting his annoyance that comedy is not deemed worthy of inclusion. He finds his comedy in loud Americans on trains, performing in Saudia Arabia, British establishment reaction to Kneecap and how the disputed part of Ireland has another way of determining if someone was catholic or protestant, just by asking for their views on the Israeli Palestinian conflict. 

As his show blossoms, he reveals a subtext not commonly found in stand up. Behind his confident and impeccably polished routine, is a sharp intelligence which delivers deeper implications as he challenges his audiences to step outside their understanding. He is not afraid to challenge, not afraid to mock the comedy industry and not afraid to tell us how desperate he remains to get on TV. Above all, in bringing and requesting an honesty, he reveals his vulnerability, but he does so with and incisive quick wit that shushes his critics and potential hecklers. In typical ballsy and unrepentant manner, the evening ends with forty percent of Cúig joining him on stage for a musical outro, singing a song with the chorus ‘Up The Ra’ to the tune from the Lion King. Long live Vittorio Angelone. Tiocfaidh ár lá.

Vittorio Angelone's You Can't Say Nothing Any More played Nottingham Arts Theatre on 11th February 2026.